Columns

FR. ROBERT BARRON

The management of the 2002 Oakland Athletics found itself in a bind. The team had performed very well the previous year, making it to the playoffs, but in the offseason, three of its best players were lured away by lucrative contracts offered by East Coast powerhouses.

In a small market and with a limited budget, the A's had to find a way to compete. Their general manager, former big-leaguer Billy Beane, stumbled on a revolutionary strategy to make the Athletics winners while remaining within their means.

Sixty-two years ago Pope Pius XII issued an encyclical, Mediator Dei, which encouraged the active participation of the faithful in the Mass. The pope was not enamoured with the common practice of people praying the rosary or other devotions during Mass, but he did make allowance for it.

The Mass then was in Latin and, to follow the Mass, one needed to have a missal with a translation of the Mass on a page facing the Latin. If one was illiterate or couldn't afford a missal, meditating on the mysteries of Christ's life was about the only way one could participate.

FR. RON ROLHEISER, omi

Today we don't attach a lot of symbolism to numbers. A few, mostly superstitious, remnants remain from former ages, such as seeing the number seven as lucky and the number 13 as unlucky. For the most part, for us, numbers are arbitrary.

This hasn't always been the case. In biblical times, they attached a lot of meaning to certain numbers. For example, in the Bible, the numbers 40, 10, 12 and 100 are highly symbolic. The number 40, for instance, speaks of the length of time required before something can come to proper fruition, while the numbers 10, 12 and 100 speak of a certain wholeness that is required to properly appropriate grace.

29th Sunday in Ordinary Time
October 16, 2011

KATHLEEN GIFFIN

My second daughter, who has Down syndrome, often went on "unauthorized walks" when she was young. It was not so much that she was running away, it was more that she was off on an adventure and had neglected to inform us of her intentions.

While there were some moments of panic as we tried to locate her, one of the most frightening times looking for her was when she was older and did not return home from her walk to the store.

JOE GUNN

When you are really sick with an infection, does it make sense to start taking only a half dose of the antibiotics necessary to cure your ailment? Or again, when battling infection, does it make sense to take an antibiotic for half of the time necessary for the full cure to take effect?

Dr. Jeff Turnbull, outgoing president of the Canadian Medical Association, reports that there are 1,000 homeless people in the core of Canada's capital city, where he lives and works.

FR. RAYMOND DE SOUZA

It's not right to characterize a people by their elected representatives. Who among us would advise our visitors that the Canadian character is what one witnesses, say, in the House of Commons during Question Period?

So the fact that many members of the German federal parliament (Bundestag) boycotted Pope Benedict's speech in that chamber last week ought not be held against the German people.

The longstanding attitude of the Alberta government that all of the province's petroleum resources must be developed as rapidly as possible remains one of its most morally dubious stances. Oil and gas are finite resources, resources that, however, will not disappear of their own accord. As well, the markets for those resources are not going away in the foreseeable future.

Nevertheless, the residents of Alberta have been subjected to a boom-and-bust economy with a discouraging rhythm of a skyrocketing cost of living followed by unemployment and government cutbacks. As well, while environmental safeguards for the industry and oilsands development are improving, there is still vast room for improvements.

FR. RON ROLHEISER, omi

Among all the great stories in the world, the most common, best-known and perennially intriguing are those that deal with heroes and heroines. These are stories that describe someone, a man or a woman who has to journey through danger, suffering, opposition, misunderstanding and humiliation to achieve some noble goal.

These kinds of stories abound in classical mythology, Scripture, epic novels and popular movies. The details of the stories vary enormously, but they have a common pattern: For noble reasons, the hero or heroine must descend into some underworld of suffering and endure that suffering, usually in the face of fierce misunderstanding and opposition, so as to eventually emerge victorious, a conqueror, a hero, an object of admiration and as one who now somehow stands above others because of this achievement.

MARIA KOZAKIEWICZ

28th Sunday in Ordinary Time
October 9, 2011

I still remember my first reading of the famous Psalm 23, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want."

I stumbled upon this text while browsing through the rich library of my priest-friend. The book of Psalms I was holding in my hands was small and tattered, with many notes and exclamation marks in the margins.